| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Lemorne Versus Huell by Elizabeth Drew Stoddard: were my dresses?--had I a black silk? she asked. I had no black
silk, and thought one would be unnecessary for hot weather.
"Who ever heard of a girl of twenty-four having no black silk!
You have slimsy muslins, I dare say?"
"Yes."
"And you like them?"
"For present wear."
That afternoon she sent Mrs. Roll out, who returned with a
splendid heavy silk for me, which Aunt Eliza said should be made
before Saturday, and it was. I went to a fashionable dress-maker of
her recommending, and on Friday it came home, beautifully made and
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from My Antonia by Willa Cather: `I didn't even know Martha wasn't my full sister until after she
was engaged to Joe,' Anna told me.
Toward the middle of the afternoon, the wagon drove in, with the father and
the eldest son. I was smoking in the orchard, and as I went out to meet them,
Antonia came running down from the house and hugged the two men as if they
had been away for months.
`Papa,' interested me, from my first glimpse of him.
He was shorter than his older sons; a crumpled little man,
with run-over boot-heels, and he carried one shoulder
higher than the other. But he moved very quickly,
and there was an air of jaunty liveliness about him.
My Antonia |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Bickerstaff-Partridge Papers by Jonathan Swift: it seems to be written near the end of Henry the Seventh's reign.
I found it in an old edition of Merlin's Prophecies, imprinted at
London by John Hawkins in the year 1530, page 39. I set it down
word for word in the old orthography, and shall take leave to
subjoin a few explanatory notes.
Seven and Ten addyd to Nyne,
Of Fraunce her Woe this is the Sygne,
Tamys Rivere twys y-frozen,
Walke sans wetyng Shoes ne Hozen.
Then comyth foorthe, ich understonde,
From Town of Stoffe to farryn Londe,
|
